


Love's What You Deserve

by carryaworld



Category: Naruto
Genre: Canon Compliant, Fluff, Hatake Kakashi Needs a Hug, Hurt/Comfort, Iruka takes no crap, Kakashi avoids his feelings and other old news, M/M, after that I make no guaranteees, at least through the chuunin exams
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:20:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28049889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carryaworld/pseuds/carryaworld
Summary: Kakashi got his wish: with Sasuke gone and Team 7 disbanded, he can go back to running S-ranked missions and being a certified loner. Unfortunately, it's not all it's cracked up to be. Umino Iruka can show him what it means to have a life beyond being a soldier, if only Kakashi can stop drowning in his guilt long enough to see it.
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka
Comments: 14
Kudos: 182





	Love's What You Deserve

**Author's Note:**

> Heya! I've been reading kakairu for ages and finally bucked up to contribute something myself because ninja dads best dads. I only actually started watching Naruto near the beginning of quarantine so I'm on like.. season six? anything past that weird Sasuke-finding beetle I learned from fanfic so forgive any inaccuracies lmao. 
> 
> title is from Freakin out on the interstate by Briston Maroney.

“Kakashi-san?” 

Kakashi blinks his eye open, fighting the weight of his eyelid as the world comes into a fuzzy focus. He’s in a tree, and while there’s nothing unusual about that, he can’t seem to remember exactly  _ when _ he got into this tree in the first place. 

He must be inside the walls of Konoha, considering how deeply he’d been asleep. There’s nowhere else where he lets his body shut down that completely. 

“Kakashi-san,” an impatient voice repeats. 

Kakashi collects himself to jump down, only to find that his limbs won’t obey him.  _ Ah, the chakra exhaustion _ . He knew he was forgetting something. 

As it is, he manages to turn his head just enough to see who has come to nag him. “Maa, Iruka-sensei,” he croaks, “Can’t a man rest?” 

Sharp brown eyes squint up at him. “Resting and passing out are not the same thing.” 

Details, details. Kakashi doesn’t have the energy to debate with Iruka. Sleeping another ten hours sounds like a much better plan. 

“You know, Naruto always tells me you’re lazy,” Iruka says conversationally. He’s clearly not letting Kakashi be anytime soon. “At first, I didn’t really believe him until I’d seen it for myself.” 

_ That’s by design _ , Kakashi thinks wryly. 

“And then I realized: if you were truly as lazy and nonchalant as you act, you’d be dead already.” Iruka is clearly on a roll now. 

“How observant of you, Iruka-sensei,” Kakashi says flatly. “Is there a point to this?” 

Iruka gives him a glare that probably sends pre-genin fleeing. Kakashi only blinks. If he had the energy to muster strong emotions, he’d be on his way to his apartment already. 

“Gai-san said you’d returned from a mission, but since he hasn’t seen you himself, he asked if I’d be willing to look around,” Iruka’s quickly working himself into a frown. “Apparently  _ someone  _ has a reputation for dragging his half-dead, chakra-depleted carcass home without seeing a medic.” 

“Who, me?” Kakashi drawls.

His eyelid is getting heavier by the moment. Helpfully, the sharingan throbs as a counterpoint. 

Iruka bristles like he’s going to burst into one of his infamous tirades, and then abruptly, he presses his lips together. “Can you get down from there?” 

Kakashi would have preferred it if he yelled. “I’ll come down when I feel like it,” he says nonchalantly. 

Unfortunately, Iruka’s bullshit detector has been honed to perfection by Naruto and the many other lawless children he manages. He calls Kakashi’s bluff. “You can’t move.” 

“I can, but I don’t want to,” Kakashi retorts, his eye curving up into a very false smile. “This is a very nice tree.” 

“Either you come down, or I can just go get Gai-san. If he hears you’re fine, I’m sure he’ll want to do a challenge.” 

“That’s low, Iruka-sensei.”

Iruka shrugs, the curl of his mouth just a touch smug. “So are you coming down?” 

Kakashi sighs. Iruka crosses his arms over his chest. Neither give. They continue this silent standoff until Iruka gets annoyed and lobs an acorn, his mouth dropping open when it thunks an annoyed Kakashi square in the forehead.

“You’re that chakra depleted?” Iruka says, aghast. “Are you okay?”

Closing his eye, Kakashi wishes he were anywhere else. “No hospital.”

Iruka scoffs at that and leaps onto the branch above him, landing soundlessly. Kakashi glares at him half heartedly. He’s hungry and stiff—if Iruka is going to force him to move it probably isn’t the worst thing.

“What can you move?” Iruka asks, his tone more serious as he properly assesses Kakashi. 

Kakashi rolls his eye. His fingers might move a little, if he forced them, but the intensity of the pain radiating from the sharingan makes him disinclined to try.

“That’s really it?” 

“Iruka-sensei,” he closes his eye again. “I’m afraid your only options are to either leave me alone, or carry me.” 

“No wonder Gai thought it was hilarious when you carried Naruto back for once,” Iruka grumbles, but he’s surprisingly deft at sliding Kakashi onto his back. 

Kakashi rests his cheek on a well-muscled shoulder. “When either of you have a chakra obliterating weapon in your face, I’ll hear your complaints.” 

Iruka is careful about jumping down, barely jostling a very limp Kakashi. “It’s really that bad?” 

Kakashi thinks of Sasuke’s twin red eyes and his stomach drops. “I am not an Uchiha.” 

Wisely, Iruka doesn’t ask any more questions. Sasuke is still a touchy topic for all of them, and Kakashi prefers not to open that particular locked box if he doesn’t have to. Naruto is naturally and loudly distraught, but every time Kakashi watches Gai help Lee with his training, his chest aches. 

He has a lot of regrets. 

Naruto has Jiraiya, and Sakura is finally excelling under Tsunade. Kakashi, without a team, is free to take S-class missions again. Once upon a time that was what he wanted. Now, he’s not so sure, and it’s not just because Tsunade is working all available jounin to the bone. 

“Kakashi-san,” Iruka’s worry-tinged voice cuts into his thoughts. The door before them is familiar, but certainly not his own. 

“This isn’t my apartment,” he says intelligently. 

“You think I know where you live?” Iruka asks, exasperated. “Try not to fall for a moment, I need my hands free.”

Kakashi can’t do much about that, but he doesn’t hit the floor while Iruka undoes his impressively complicated wards, so it’s a success anyway. 

“You could have ditched me at the hospital anyway,” Kakashi says, a little bewildered as Iruka sets him on a worn but comfortable couch. “That’s what Gai does.” 

Iruka rolls his shoulders out and shrugs. “Not like you’d stay there anyway.” 

“Maa, Iruka-sensei has been listening to too many rumors.” His eye smile buys him no leniency. 

A blanket is thrown around his shoulders and tucked in with more gentleness than Kakashi is accustomed to. “Tea?” Iruka asks, already heading for the kitchen.

Iruka’s apartment is small but homey—not too messy but also not meticulously cleaned. Kakashi feels like a stranger here, and yet like he could become a part of this little place too. 

“I don’t want to trouble you,” Kakashi doesn’t want to be a burden, although he fears he already is one.

He gets a flat look. “Kakashi-san. Would you like tea.” 

It seems less and less like a question. “Yes, please,” Kakashi says, because he has a feeling Iruka would serve him some either way. 

Iruka nurtures where Kakashi has always destroyed. The juxtaposition makes him want to laugh and cry. He’s bone-deep tired in a way he hasn’t been since his early ANBU days. Too much failure does that to a person, and Kakashi has never forgotten the mountain made up of his shortcomings. 

“What are you making that face for?” Iruka squints at him, pressing a freshly steeped cup of tea into Kakashi’s limp hands. 

Kakashi is making a face, but 99% of it isn’t even visible. “How did you know I was making a face?” 

“The eyebrows give you away.”

“Do they really?” Kakashi muses, staring into the swirling amber depths of his tea. Even Gai is not this adept at reading him. 

Iruka scoffs. “Yes? Did you actually think that was fooling people?” 

It fools more than enough. People think he’s stone-cold, a friend-killer. Even Iruka himself has accused Kakashi of something along those lines, though he apologized afterwards. 

Kakashi is used to only being seen on the surface level. Very few people dip below that—Gai and Tenzou namely. Obito, Rin, and Minato too, once. 

Black spots flicker at the edges of his vision and Kakashi lets them swallow him under. He’s so tired. Tired enough that it doesn’t matter that Iruka is sitting just a few feet away, and Kakashi just passed out right in front of him. 

* 

Kakashi wakes with the blanket tucked up to his chin, and somehow not covered in the tea he fell asleep holding. 

“Ah, you’re awake my esteemed rival,” a familiar voice rumbles, though at a more respectable volume than normal. Gai. 

The room comes into focus, completely unfamiliar. “Gai, what—?” 

Gai is perched on a nearby chair,  _ ah that’s right, Iruka’s _ , with a concerned frown. “Iruka-sensei had to go teach the enthusiastic youth, so he asked me to make sure you hadn’t died on his couch while he was gone.” 

“I’m not dead,” Kakashi grumbles, petulantly scrunching his eye shut. Not yet. Not this time. 

The chair creaks ominously as Gai leans forward. If it breaks, Iruka is going to yell until he’s blue in the face. 

“Kakashi,” Gai says, and Kakashi doesn’t like that tone one bit. It’s too serious. 

He trusts Gai with his life. In fact, he’s placed his life in Gai’s hands more times than he cares to count. But it never makes these talks any easier. 

“Come help with Lee’s training this weekend.” Gai does not phrase it like a question. 

Kakashi pulls the blanket up over his face so he doesn’t have to even chance seeing the concern in Gai’s expression. “Gai.” 

“Why not?” Gai presses. “Tsunade isn’t going to give you another mission for at least a week.” 

“You don’t know that.” 

Gai’s answering chortle shakes him to his core. “I do know that, my most esteemed rival. Because Iruka-sensei told Sakura-chan, who of course told the Godaime, that you are too chakra-depleted to move.” 

Kakashi groans. Tsunade is going to make his life living hell for being as reckless as he was on that mission. 

“Your most youthful student should be here soon, actually.” 

Sakura’s coming? Kakashi is doomed. She’s learning a lot from Tsunade, including how to be an absolute force of nature. Their personalities are terrifyingly similar, and now that Kakashi is no longer Sakura’s teacher, she’s much more willing to give him a piece of her mind. 

Kakashi has a lot of mixed feelings about it. 

There’s no doubt that Sakura is blossoming under a better teacher, he knows he let her down. She was never going to get the attention she needed on a team with Naruto and Sasuke, who were too much to handle on their own, much less combined. Kakashi still wonders why the Sandaime ever thought he was capable of teaching them.

“Kakashi,” Gai interrupts his thoughts.

“Fine. I’ll come to training,” he allows. Sometimes it’s better to just go along with what Gai wants because it’s less work in the end. 

“Perfect! I will see you then, I must get back to my students!” 

Kakashi is just relieved that Gai is leaving him in peace. As it is, he manages to snag another fifteen minutes of sleep between Gai leaving and Sakura’s arrival. She lets herself in, probably with permission from Iruka. 

“Sakura, you look well,” he manages an eye-smile and the smallest wiggle of his fingers. 

Head tilted to the side, Sakura gives him a  _ look. _ “You look terrible, Kakashi-sensei. Why are you giving Iruka-sensei trouble?”

“Who’s giving who trouble?” Kakashi feigns innocence. “I was minding my own business.” 

Sakura snorts. “Passed out in a tree.” 

Kakashi desperately wishes she still had some sort of respect for him. “Maa, Sakura-chan. These things happen.” 

Plopping her medical bag on the floor, Sakura starts digging through it. “To you? Apparently a lot, so I’m told. If anything is serious you’re still going to have to go to the hospital, I’m only in training.” 

Humming, Kakashi lets his eye fall closed. “I trust you.” 

Sakura squeaks in surprise at that, and is mercifully mollified into silence while she works. There isn’t much to find, at least not this time. The few minor injuries he’d acquired he treated in the field—Kakashi is occasionally reckless, but he’s not stupid. 

He’s no use to the village dead. There’s already a shortage of shinobi without Kakashi taking up a spot on the memorial stone. 

Sakura is still a fledgling medi-nin, but he’s impressed with how she’s doing so far. 

“Alright,” she says, sitting back. “Nothing except the chakra exhaustion seems serious.” 

Kakashi hums again. He already knew that, but while he’s no longer a teacher, he still knows when to let a teaching moment play out. “And?” 

  
“And, if I hear that you’ve exerted yourself at all in the next week or so, I’m telling the Godaime on you,” she huffs. 

A bunch of tattle tails, the lot of them. Even Gai quickly caught on that Kakashi has a healthy respect for Tsunade. He’d be a fool not to. Not only is she his boss, she’s also a Sannin and perfectly happy to kick his ass. 

Waking up for the first time after getting hit with the infinite tsukuyomi to her yelling at him… Kakashi shudders.

“Kakashi-sensei,” Sakura says, and her tone has Kakashi looking up despite himself. “You should really take better care of yourself.” 

Her brows furrow, but she starts speaking again before Kakashi can open his mouth. “Naruto and I can’t lose you too.” 

For a moment, Kakashi can’t breathe. He promised these children that no matter what, he’d never let anything happen to them. In that way, he’s already failed Sasuke.  But to think that he can fail them this way too…

“You won’t,” Kakashi promises, low and firm. “I’m not going anywhere, Sakura.”

He hopes—desperately so—that this is one promise that fate will let him keep. Sakura sniffs and dashes hastily at her eyes, but manages to give him a wobbly smile. 

“Good. And stop giving Iruka-sensei trouble.” 

Kakashi sighs dramatically, and it has the desired effect of widening that smile. “Okay.” 

She goes then, leaving him in the eerie silence of someone else’s apartment. Kakashi determinedly settles in to sleep while he can, despite the crick Iruka’s couch is putting in his neck.

*

“So you’re not dead after all,” Iruka observes, some hours later. 

Kakashi has barely moved from his spot, as his limbs are in the ‘slowly returning to feeling’ stage and it hurts like a bitch. 

“I’m not dead after all,” he agrees. Being dead would be less painful. 

“Don’t you get tired of doing this?” Iruka asks. He’s too blunt, but Kakashi can tell from the thoughtful downturn of his mouth that it’s not meant to be an attack. So much like Naruto, it’s a little funny. 

“Do you think I enjoy this?” Kakashi returns mildly. “Chakra exhaustion is not exactly comfortable.”

Iruka is quiet for a moment, his gaze piercing through to Kakashi’s very soul. “So then why?” 

Kakashi manages a painfully shallow shrug. “It is my duty.” 

“To run yourself into the ground?” Iruka asks, disbelieving. 

“To complete the missions my village needs me to complete,” Kakashi corrects. “And to protect those who live here.” 

Iruka’s eyebrows dip into an even deeper groove. “Do you really have to—“ he stops then, breathes out. Laughs under his breath in a way that’s distinctly self deprecating under Kakashi’s watchful eye. “I should know better, shouldn’t I? I teach them the Will of Fire, after all.” 

“Is that what you teach at the academy?” Kakashi quips, only half kidding. He gets a funny look for that. “What, sensei? I spent very little time there.” 

Huffing, Iruka shakes his head. “I hope we never go back to those times.” 

Kakashi’s silence is a question. There are a lot of times he wishes to leave behind. 

“Sending our children to war,” Iruka clarifies. 

His body language says it all—teeth bared, shoulders tensed. Iruka has never shied away from what he believes in. And Kakashi, Kakashi has seen it first hand and it’s made him reconsider.

He thinks if Itachi, of Sasuke, of all the young ninjas he failed before team 7 finally passed the bell test. Lastly, he thinks of himself. Kakashi has never let himself slow down and consider the repercussions of making chuunin and then jounin as early as he did, because it opens a door to more emotional trauma than he has the capability of handling at this point. 

But he wonders.  _ What would life have been like, otherwise? _

If he’d attended the academy with other ninja his age, instead of completing assassinations the moment Minato inducted him into ANBU. If his life had something more to it than just being a soldier. 

“Why are you letting me stay?” Kakashi asks abruptly, cutting his own thoughts off. 

“The Godaime insisted you’d be much less of a menace to yourself on my couch,” Iruka shrugs. “Who am I to tell her no?” 

The room quiets for a moment. 

“And because I want to,” Iruka adds softly. 

“You’re a kind person, Iruka-sensei.” 

Ruefully, Iruka shakes his head. “I don’t think so, really. I loathed Naruto for the longest time for killing my parents.” 

Iruka would have been young during the kyuubi attack—another orphan in Konoha. No wonder he's taken an interest in Naruto despite his initial feelings. 

“Even now, some of the village still holds him responsible for that,” Kakashi says. 

There’s a spark of fury in Iruka’s eyes before he breathes out a long sigh. “It’s unfair. It took me too long to see it, they’ll get there eventually too. Naruto is just… good.” 

“He is,” Kakashi agrees. Naruto is a too-loud brat with the attention span of a goldfish, but there’s no denying that he’s a caring person. A good person. 

Iruka’s gaze drifts for a moment before he straightens abruptly. “I’m a terrible host, aren’t I? Let me order some takeout for dinner.” 

“Maa, sensei, you needn’t go to the trouble.” Kakashi is hungry, yes, but he’s had much worse and he’s already far overstaying his welcome. There’s probably a ration bar in his vest that he can crunch on if he gets truly desperate.

“Trust me, Kakashi-san, I am not a good cook.” 

Kakashi decides that this is not a battle worth fighting and let’s the couch draw him in deeper. “I’ll show you how sometime, if you want.”

Iruka gives him a deeply skeptical look. “You can cook?” 

“I have to feed myself, don’t I?”

“Feeding yourself does not mean you are a good cook, take me for example,” Iruka disagrees. 

Kakashi has the childish urge to stick his tongue out, even though it’d mean he’d just be licking the inside of his mask. “Some of us like eating things that don’t taste like cardboard or ramen, sensei,” he leers. “I’ll teach you.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” Iruka threatens as he stuffs his feet in his sandals. “Don’t get up to trouble while I’m gone.” 

“I’m insulted, Iruka-sensei!” Kakashi gripes at his retreating back. Perhaps it’s time for another cat-nap. 

*

Kakashi limps home in the morning after Iruka leaves for the academy, and sighs at the dusty state of his apartment. Tsunade needs to stop sending him on such long missions. 

It was strange sharing a meal with someone last night. Kakashi has friends amongst the jounin, and while he rarely allows them to drag him into their shenanigans, he’d at least get drinks with them every once and awhile. 

These days, it’s rare for any of them to be in the village at the same time. 

Kakashi breathes out a sigh and resigns himself to eating ration bars until he can go to the market without limping. It would ruin his reputation if he were to be spotted by the general populace in such a state, and Tsunade would probably come down on his head for not resting. 

So instead, Kakashi tends Mr. Ukki where the plant perches on his window sill, and then pitches face first into his bed. Sleep comes mercifully fast, even with the way his body aches. 

He comes-to again later in the afternoon to a familiar form perched in his window and groceries on his counter. Truly, he does not deserve his kouhai. 

“Tenzou,” he drags himself into a seated position. “I didn’t know you were in the village.” 

Tenzou for once doesn’t have his ANBU cat mask on, though Kakashi suspects it's on his person somewhere. The look he gives Kakashi is fondly exasperated. “Only for an hour or two, and then my team goes back out again.”

“She’s a goddamned menace,” Kakashi groans, earning himself a reproving look. 

“It needs to be done, senpai,” Tenzou reprimands him. 

Kakashi scrubs a hand over his face “God, don’t I know. Thank you for the groceries, Tenzou. You truly are my favorite kouhai.” 

Tenzou snorts, but the corner of his mouth lifts up anyway. “Enjoy your enforced rest,” he quips, and slips out the window. 

Kakashi drags himself up to put the groceries away, his breath catching softly as he finds two eggplants at the bottom of one of the bags, along with miso soup ingredients. Truly, Kakashi is fortunate in the few friends he has. He’ll have to properly thank Tenzou later, though his friend probably will brush him off. 

After all these years, there is no more debt between them.

Kakashi digs his cutting board out and very slowly sets to work preparing the first real meal he’s had in months, his joints aching fiercely in protest. 

*

“I’m behaving myself,” Kakashi complains as Iruka marches across the training grounds toward him. 

He has a book in his lap, seated with his back against a tree while Gai works his team into the ground. Kakashi himself hasn’t lifted a single finger. That wasn’t the point, after all, Gai’s goal was simply to keep Kakashi from sulking in his apartment the whole week he has off.

Though, since Kakashi is used to looking underneath the underneath, he suspects that Gai wants him to take something away from this. Comfort, from the familiar bickering of a team of three talented genin? Maybe. 

Iruka stops in front of Kakashi. “Hold your hand out,” he prompts, his own tucked behind his back. 

Kakashi squints suspiciously. Iruka was well known amongst the ANBU in his younger days for his ambitious pranks. Holding his hand out, Kakashi prepares himself to yank it back quickly. 

It turns out not to be necessary, because all Iruka does is plop a toad summon in his palm and look very pleased with himself. 

“What’s this?” Kakashi raises an eyebrow. 

“A message from Naruto,” Iruka says cheerfully. “Remember when you plopped a dog in my hand and vanished? Payback.” And then he’s gone. 

The summon has a note from Naruto asking for money, because Jiraiya has blown most of their funds again. Kakashi sighs. He should have known. 

Very clever of Iruka to pass this off to him, though he suspects that if Iruka had the funds, he would have just sent them to Naruto. He treats the brat like family after all, but a teacher’s salary must be pretty cruddy. 

Kakashi himself is notorious for ducking out on bills, but that’s a.) to discourage people from dragging him out to socialize and b.) to gauge if someone actually wants his company. Gai complains a lot, but never truly minds buying lunch, and Kakashi pays him back anyway by shoving coins in odd places around his apartment. 

Between his jounin pay, the S-ranks he’s been taking, and the inheritance he hasn’t had the opportunity to touch, Kakashi is rarely in want of money. 

He fishes around for his wallet and counts out enough to cover Naruto, and then scrounges paper out of his vest pocket to scribble  _ from your sensei(s)  _ and a very pointed threat to Jiraiya to go with it. 

  
If Jiraiya wants any money out of Kakashi, he’d better be trading it for a novel. He’s a grown ass adult, after all, and Kakashi certainly isn’t harboring any overly fond feelings towards him. 

Jiraiya probably has his reasons for disappearing for years on end and shirking his godfather duties, but it’s really not Kakasi’s problem. He couldn’t be there for his sensei’s son when he was a teen himself, and Jiraiya dropped the ball. Let him make up for it now. 

“What do you have there, Kakashi?” Gai asks as he sends the toad on its way. 

“Just my student, being a nuisance,” Kakashi sticks his nose back in his book. “Nothing to worry about.” 

“Hmmm,” Gai rumbles. “Come give me your opinion on Neiji’s youthful gentle fists.” 

Another sigh. “If I must.” 

*

Kakashi does not encounter Iruka again before he departs the village, nor in between his next consecutive string of missions. He finds himself vaguely disappointed about it, dragging himself in through his apartment window in the wee hours of the morning, fresh from reporting to Tsunade and grabbing a few hours of sleep before his next mission.

Sasuke is still out there, and there’s nothing he can do about it. Tsunade has decided to make the most of the three year reprieve, and won’t waste manpower chasing a nin who doesn’t want to come home.

Only Naruto and Sakura still hold out hope of bringing him home.

Kakashi lays on his bed and feels sleep evade him, flexing his fingers absently as if he can feel the chidori. It was a mistake, teaching it to Sasuke. When he created the jutsu, he never imagined it being used against a comrade, and yet that was exactly what Sasuke used it for. 

The way Naruto was when Kakashi finally got there… he has no doubt that it was rasengan vs. chidori absolute nightmare. He understands why Jiraiya taught Naruto the jutsu, he had something similar in mind when he taught Sasuke. 

Anything to protect their students when they weren’t there themselves. How spectacularly that backfired. 

With a groan, Kakashi drags himself upright. If he can’t sleep, then there’s no point lying here spiraling. So he wanders the village instead, finally settling in a tree near the academy that happens to have a view of Iruka’s classroom. 

He is not, in any way, prepared for Iruka to come marching over to him a scant few minutes before the students are set to arrive, when the sun is barely cresting the trees.

“You told Naruto the money was from both of us?” he barks up at Kakashi. 

Kakashi racks his brain for the incident in question. “Oh. Yes? I also told Jiraiya to stuff it and stop taking the brat’s money.” 

Iruka is giving him a strange look, his mouth working like he can’t seem to come up with the words he wants. “Why? I just dropped it on you.” 

There isn’t a good answer for that, really. Or maybe the problem is that there are too many. Too many reasons why Kakashi wants to feel a connection with Iruka, and only a few of them involve Naruto. 

“Maa, he wouldn’t believe I sent him anything in good faith, but he trusts you,” Kakashi brushes it off. His gaze sharpens on Iruka. “Besides, you would have sent him something if you could, no? Just treat him to ramen next time he’s home, I don’t mind contributing to looking out for our little student.” 

The look Iruka gives him is uncomfortably shrewd. 

Kakashi’s saving grace, just this once, is the circling cry of the messenger hawk above. Tsunade must have his next mission ready. 

He drops to the ground, stashing his book in his vest. “Apologies sensei, that’s my cue.” 

Kakashi doesn’t look back to see what Iruka’s face is doing now. This little experiment of his is becoming quite dangerous for his heart. 

*

“Boss.” 

Kakashi, over the years, has catalogued most of Pakkun’s judgmental faces. His ninken have been with him for most of his life, and are sometimes his sole company. 

This face, however, is a new one. 

“Yes, Pakkun?” he parrots back. 

“You’re making me deliver  _ pens _ to the sonny boy teacher?” Pakkun is really laying it on thick. “Why can’t you do it yourself?” 

_ Why can’t he do it himself, indeed. _ Part of it is cowardice, certainly. Part of it is suspicion that Iruka will accept a gift more readily from Pakkun than he would from Kakashi himself. 

Pakkun squints harder at him. “Are you… trying to court Iruka-sensei?” 

Kakashi should really stop letting his ninken watch movies. They give them  _ notions _ , as if they weren’t already inclined to meddle in Kakashi’s life. 

“We are  _ friends _ ,” Kakashi says pointedly. 

Pakkun looks distinctly unimpressed. “Uh huh. Sure boss.” 

“Just do it, please.”

And Pakkun goes, though he’s clearly not happy about it. It’s not like he would understand Kakashi’s reasoning anyway. 

There’s a list, practically, of reasons why Kakashi dating is a bad idea. The emotional trauma and his difficulty trusting people is near the top, accompanied by his fear of losing those close to him. Fool me twice, and all that. Kakashi has learned that lesson several times over. 

And then, his disinterest in sex is the neat little bow on top. It baffles him on a regular basis that there’s constant rumors in the village about his sex life, considering it’s nonexistant. 

Other people are aesthetically pleasing, sure, but his interest stops there. It’s always been that way. 

Kakashi is fine with this part of himself—it’s one of the few things he doesn’t deride himself over—but he can see how that might be a hang up for some people. He’s tried it, and it wasn’t that great. Sue him. 

“Senpai,” a voice cuts into his thoughts, and Kakashi gives an automatic eye-smile to the familiar cat mask. 

“What can I do for you, Cat?” 

“Lady Hokage has requested you depart with my team at once. Be at the gate in twenty, I will gather the rest.” Tenzou is gone almost as soon as his last words hit the air, and Kakashi is inclined to move nearly as quickly. 

Tsunade wants him on a mission with an ANBU team? Nothing about that is good. Kakashi was removed from ANBU service by the Sandaime, and he never imagined he’d be going back even in an unofficial capacity. 

Whatever this is, it can’t be good. 

Kakashi thinks of the Hound mask, locked away in the depths of a mildewed closet at the Hatake estate. One more time, then. 

*

The scratch of pen on paper draws Kakashi into wakefulness. Without opening his eye, he knows that the warm weight by his feet is Pakkun. 

“Bed hog,” he grumbles, lifting a hand to scrub the crust out of his eyes after a brief trial and error over which one is hooked up to the IV. 

“Excuse me?” a voice interrupts the inventory Kakashi is taking of his body.

Kakashi stills, his eye sweeping the room until it lands on Iruka, who is inexplicably using his bedside chair to catch up on his grading. 

“Oh, sensei,” he coughs awkwardly. “I was talking to Pakkun.” 

The look Iruka gives him is dryer than the Land of Wind.

Pakkun, the goddamned traitor, does not even lift his head in acknowledgement. Kakashi does not hiss in pain when he stretches his leg out to nudge Pakkun, but it’s a near thing. 

“My team?” He prompts his ninken. They’re what matters, after all, and the fact that Tenzou is not here hovering is concerning. 

“They’re all alive,” Iruka answers as Pakkun yawns. “Most of them are in better shape than you, or so I’m told.” 

Glaring at his traitor summons, Kakashi releases him. Pakkun makes a disgruntled noise as he goes, but it serves him right. 

No, of course they’re not here. They’d be treated where ANBU operatives are always treated, and not in the public. Apparently, coming out of retirement just this once did not warrant Kakashi that luxury.

He can breathe easier, however, just knowing that they’re safe. Wearing the ANBU mask again meant that his trademark jutsu were off limits, including the sharingan, to avoid someone identifying him. Getting his team out of a hairy situation alive without it is what landed him here. 

It was worth it, though. Kakashi won’t ever leave a comrade behind. 

“Maa, sorry sensei,” he scrubs a hand over his face. He hurts, sitting up would probably not be a good idea just now. “What are you doing here?”

It’s Iruka’s turn to be flustered, staring down at his too-familiar pen. “I, uh, happened to be in the area?” 

It’s a poor excuse and they both know it, but Kakashi doesn’t have the capacity to deal with his feelings just now, so he lets it slide. The silence is somewhat awkward, but Kakashi doesn’t feel obliged to be any nicer when he’s the one in the hospital bed. 

“You owe me a cooking lesson,” Iruka blurts, his face immediately heating up to an impressive shade of red. 

Kakashi blinks. “I do.” He does. 

He desperately, stupidly, wants a quiet evening with Iruka. More than anything. Kakashi is opening his mouth to say as much when Tsunade sweeps into the room.

“Oh perfect, Iruka is here. I’ll make scheduling your little date easy then,” she smirks. “Iruka, you’re in charge of making sure this brat doesn’t rip his stitches.”

Iruka beats Kakashi to the punch. “What?!”

Kakashi scowls. “I am not a wayward child.”

“Shut up, brat, I’m doing you a favor.”

“You’re meddling.” 

“Do I need to make it an order? Because I can.”

They lock in a silent stare down until Iruka pipes in, “I can keep an eye on Kakashi-san.”

When the Hokage gives an order…of course Iruka is going to heed it. Kakashi slumps back in defeat, glaring as Tsunade prods his very sore wound.

“Perfect. Iruka, would you mind stepping out to collect Kakashi’s things for discharge?”

Iruka takes the opportunity to bolt, his papers practically flapping in the wind. Kakashi flicks Tsunade another glare. 

Tsunade, however, is all business with Iruka gone. “Were you able to get the intel?”

“Barely. It was tight, everyone is running on fumes.”

She sighs and continues prodding him. “What would you have me do?”

Kakashi frowns at the ceiling. “There’s nothing else we can do. Adjust the shifts, maybe?” 

“You’ve worked for three Hokages now, Kakashi. What am I missing?” 

He’s tired. He really is, to the bone, weary of it all. Everyone is, though. Tsunade included. 

“I’ll think on it,” he offers. Kakashi can’t muster up any of his notorious genius just now, but sleep might help. 

Tsunade gives him a thoughtful look. “Okay. So, you and the chuunin teacher, huh?”

“I will climb out that window,” he threatens. 

“What? I’m not allowed to be curious?” 

“No.” 

Kakashi has given everything else he has to the village and it’s Hokages, it can’t have this. 

“You know, I’ve heard some rumors,” Tsunade smirks, pressing a too-strong hand down on Kakashi’s chest as he struggles to sit up. 

It is at that merciful moment that Iruka returns, Gai hot on his heels. 

“My most esteemed rival!” Gai cries, and Kakashi sinks into his blankets. 

Iruka, the ass, looks frankly too amused by this. “I figured he could give us a hand.” 

Kakashi sighs. “Can we just go.” 

Tsunade is enjoying this more than should be allowed, but she discharges him anyway with a laundry list of threats of what will happen if he violates his bedrest. “And I mean it!” she yells after them. 

Kakashi, sandwiched with Gai and Iruka supporting him on either side, could not give less of a damn. He would have liked to check up on Tenzou, but to do so with Gai and Iruka in tow would have jeopardized his identity. 

And so, they make the long journey to Iruka’s apartment. Gai fills the time with his own chatter—Lee is evidently doing well, as are Neiji and Tenten. Frankly, it’s all white noise to Kakashi, who is simply grateful when Iruka unlocks his wards. 

“Thank you Gai, I can take it from here.” 

Gai outright beams. “Thank you, Iruka-sensei, for looking after my most esteemed rival!”

Kakashi half thinks Gai might still be talking when Iruka kicks the door shut and lowers him onto the couch. It’s rather surreal, being here again. “Feels like nothing has changed,” he murmurs, mostly to himself. 

It’s not meant to be a bitter statement, but he’s tired.

Iruka shakes his head. “It has. Naruto is stronger now. I was amazed to see him use the Yondaime’s jutsu.”

“The rasengan.” 

The look Iruka slides him is thoughtful. “He was your jounin-sensei.” 

“Minato-sensei? Yes,” Kakashi’s voice is level out of practice, but he’s perhaps too weary for this conversation. It rarely comes up, what with the ban on telling Naruto about his history. 

“Is Naruto like him?” Iruka asks quietly. 

Kakashi thinks about it. “He’s all his mother’s fire, with his father’s heart.” 

He’s seen it too often, Naruto’s willingness to forgive. Kakashi has not let Minato’s visage overtake Naruto’s own person, that wouldn’t be fair to the boy, but sometimes he blinks and sees his mentor staring back at him. 

Yes, Kakashi is too tired for this conversation. He holds his palm up, wincing as his side pulls. “Paper and pen?” 

Iruka blinks, probably at both the request and the abrupt change of subject. “What?” 

“I’ll make a grocery list,” Kakashi says. At the blank look Iruka gives him, he clarifies, “.... so we can make dinner?”

“You don’t have any paper in your—oh. Where’s your vest?” 

Kakashi scowls. “Ask the Hokage. She kept it and hid my Icha Icha novel out of spite.” 

Iruka snorts but acquires the requested items. “Well, your list had better be more legible than your mission reports, or else you’ll be very disappointed.” 

“Maa, sensei, you wound me. Don’t you think my handwriting is pretty?”

“You ninken could do better."

“Don’t tell Pakkun that, his ego is already too big.”

“And yours isn’t?” Iruka counters. 

_ Ouch _ .

Kakashi makes a pointed effort to write neatly. He’s capable of nice handwriting, his father had made a point of it before he died, but Kakashi can never be bothered. Usually he’s exhausted, rushed, or both when he fills mission reports out, if he does them at all. 

He passes it over. “Is that up to your standards, sensei?”

Iruka squints at it. “I expect all your mission reports to look like this from now on.” 

“You’ll have to make it worth my effort, sensei,” Kakashi smiles. 

Iruka gives him a dirty look and heads for the door. “I’ll be back.” 

*

“Are you sure you should be standing up for this?” Iruka frets as Kakashi limps into the kitchen. 

Kakashi shrugs, “Who knows.”    
  


That is evidently the incorrect answer, because Iruka drags a chair in and forces Kakashi to sit in it. The sun has dropped low on the horizon, leaving Iruka’s home painted in warm oranges and pinks. 

Iruka isn’t as bad at cooking as he claims to be—he’s quite proficient at chopping vegetables. He’s also a fast learner, patiently following Kakashi’s instructions and asking clarifying questions. 

“Alright, drop the dashi in the broth,” Kakashi directs, propping his chin in his hand. 

Humming, Iruka gives the pot a gentle stir and starts on the next thing. 

“I’d say you must have been a good student, sensei, except I know you were quite the prankster.” 

He gets a sidelong look. “And how would you know that?” 

Kakashi’s eye smile is earnest. “I’m sure you know that you had quite the reputation amongst the ANBU for your pranks.” 

Iruka makes a considering noise in the back of his throat. “I didn’t think you would have been old enough to be serving then.” 

This conversation is in theoreticals of course, because Kakashi can’t outright say that he was ANBU, though most of the village assumes as much. 

“I made jounin before the nine-tails attack,” is his roundabout explanation. 

Iruka says nothing to this, holding the spoon out so that Kakashi can taste his work. He falters briefly and then averts his eyes, allowing Kakashi a quick moment to pull his mask down.

The courtesy strikes a deep ache in Kakashi’s chest that burns and burns. He wants. He wants so badly it hurts, but is this really something he can have?  Kakashi loses people, it’s a rule with only a few exceptions. Does he dare risk Iruka?

“Kakashi-san,” Iruka says. He’s still not looking at Kakashi, but Kakashi can feel the weight of his attention. 

“Just Kakashi,” Kakashi corrects him. “And it needs more soy sauce.”

Iruka obediently adds what he’s told, leaving it to simmer while he gets bowls down from the cabinet.  The meal itself is quiet, but in a comfortable way. It’s simple but hearty food—Kakashi will show off his true skills another time, preferably when his entire side isn’t throbbing. 

“This was good,” Iruka tells him, just the slightest hint of a challenge tugging his mouth up at the corners. 

“Next time, let me cook for you when I’m not fresh out of the hospital,” Kakashi counters. 

He’s flagging now, the warm weight of food in his stomach and the drain of another healing dragging him down. Iruka seems to notice, ushering him to the couch. 

“I have to do my grading, but you might as well sleep.” 

“Mmm,” Kakashi agrees. Sleep would be ideal. 

Iruka settles him in, collecting a pillow and a warm blanket from his own room. “Thank you for the pens,” he says, when Kakashi is just a moment from sleep. 

“Welcome,” Kakashi murmurs, and remembers nothing else. 

*

Kakashi wakes up with the scent of blood in his nose and a cold sweat creeping over his skin. The unfamiliarity of the couch makes it hard to ground himself, but he’s still glad he managed to get Iruka to sleep in his own bed. Even if it was because Iruka probably felt bad about waking him to move. 

He braces his elbows on his knees and breathes out and then in again, catching faint hints of Iruka’s preferred tea and the shampoo he likes to use. 

All of it, everything he dreamt, is in the past. It’s real, but he can’t do anything about it now. Just his usual batch of nightmares, with the fun addition of Sasuke standing over Naruto’s body, sharingans spinning. 

Barely audible footsteps make him tense, but he looks up to find a mostly asleep Iruka squinting at him. “I heard something hit the floor.” 

Kakashi glances around himself, and finds that he must have knocked over one of Iruka’s knick knacks when he shot upright. “Maa, it’s nothing. Go back to sleep, Iruka.” 

Iruka ignores him, filling a glass of water in the kitchen, which Kakashi takes gratefully. And then, inexplicably, he shoves his fingers into Kakashi’s hair, gently working through messy strands. 

Dumbfounded, Kakashi holds very still, as if moving will fully wake Iruka and scare him out of this weird affection. It’s hard to stay that way, however, when the scrape of fingertips against his scalp brings his heart rate back down.

He catches himself leaning into the touch, eyelids drooping. “Mmmm.”

Iruka’s small, pleased smile is barely visible in the dark. “I do this sometimes for Naruto, when he has nightmares.”

“Iruka,” Kakashi isn’t sure how to say that he doesn’t deserve something that Iruka does for his family. 

“Hush,” Iruka tugs lightly on a white strand. “No one was there to do it for me, so I’m glad to be able to for people I care about.” 

Kakashi opens his mouth, only to close it again because  _ Iruka cares about him? _ His brain must be scrambled—a genjitsu maybe? 

All thoughts stop as Iruka leans in, resting his forehead against Kakashi’s. “Stop thinking so hard,” he murmurs the reprimand. 

Powerless to do anything else, Kakashi obeys. He falls back asleep to the sensation of Iruka’s kind touch.

  
*

Something changes, after that. 

Iruka becomes an unshakeable facet of Kakashi’s life, ducking in and out at will. Kakashi is still gone frequently, but Iruka’s apartment becomes a post mission safe haven. He can always count on a cup of tea and comfortable silence while Iruka works on his grading. 

Tsunade doesn’t even bother with threatening Kakashi anymore, smugly confident in his model behavior after Iruka ripped into him for trying to escape the hospital early once. 

“You look happy, my eternal rival,” Gai comments after one of their challenges, a climb up the side of a cliff face. “I am glad you’re enjoying the springtime of your youth.” 

“Gai,” Kakashi sighs his complaint, sipping from his water bottle. 

Gai, being Gai, is undeterred. “You are,” he insists. “I can tell.” 

Kakashi tilts his head back to look at the sky. Is he really that different? He still visits the memorial stone in his free time, still has far too many regrets.  But they’re not as heavy now.

“Are you going to court Umino Iruka?” Gai persists, because only Gai or Pakkun would call it courting and not dating. 

“Maybe,” Kakashi allows, because it’ll shut Gai up. 

He’s considered it, yes. He’s just not sure that it would be the best decision for  _ Iruka _ . Kakashi is not an easy person to stomach, as he’s been so often reminded.  He’s also quite frequently in near-death situations. Is that fair, to a partner? Can Kakashi give Iruka enough to make it worth it?

Gai’s large hand drops onto his shoulder and squeezes a touch too hard. The smile he offers is reassuring, kind in a way that makes Kakashi’s heart stop rattling so desperately in his chest. 

“Be happy, Kakashi.” 

Kakashi snorts. “If you say so.” 

*

Naruto makes a rare appearance in Konoha, finding a bandaged Kakashi dozing off under Iruka’s kotatsu. 

“Ew, what are you doing here?” his former student groans, kicking the door shut behind him. 

It’s not surprising that the boy is keyed into the wards, he’s Iruka’s family after all. Kakashi blinks at him. “That’s a rude way of speaking to your sensei, whomst you haven’t seen in months.” 

Naruto raises both eyebrows, unimpressed. The sheer audacity of it is unreal. “Why are you here?” he repeats. 

Kakashi pouts. “Am I not allowed to make a social call to Iruka-sensei?” 

“He’s not even here!” 

“Who’s not even here?” Iruka’s voice sounds in the doorway, making Naruto jump straight out of his skin. 

It’s all Kakashi can do to not bust up laughing.

Iruka sets the groceries on the counter and fixes Naruto with a frown. “I surprised you? Really? A ninja should always be alert.” 

“You didn’t!” Naruto waves his arms. “I want to know why he’s here!” An accusing finger jabs at Kakashi. 

A pair of warm brown eyes settle on Kakashi, and Iruka’s face softens. “You’re back in one piece.” 

“Maa, sensei, you make that sound unusual,” Kakashi protests. 

Iruka snorts. “It is.” 

Naruto just stands there, mouth agape. “ _ Iruka-sensei _ .” 

“ _ What _ ?” Iruka parrots back at him. 

“You just… let him in your HOUSE?” Naruto’s squawking now and it grates on Kakashi’s ears. 

Iruka starts putting the groceries away, clearly immune to the volume at this point. “Yes? Kakashi knows he’s always welcome.” 

Kakashi lifts his book up over his face so that neither of them can see him blush. He knows this rule by now, but the reminder always makes him feel warm.

“YOU KEYED THAT PORN-READING PERVY OLD MAN TO THE WARDS?” 

Iruka snatches Naruto up by the ear, as if Naruto isn’t nearly his equal in height now. “That’s not how you talk about your sensei, is it Naruto?” he growls. 

If they’re going to get in a shouting match, Kakashi is going to find a quiet tree to sit in. He starts slinking toward the window, but Iruka pins him to the spot with his stare.  “Sit back down.” 

Kakashi meekly does as he’s told. Naruto is wincing as Iruka spins him around to face Kakashi. 

“Sorry Kakashi-sensei,” he mumbles without prompting. This isn’t a new routine, though it’s been quite a while. Kakashi feels rather nostalgic about it. 

“Good,” Iruka says approvingly and lets him go. “Now start chopping the vegetables for dinner.”

“But I just got hereeeeee,” Naruto whines, but sulks off to do as he’s told. 

Iruka smiles after him. “So how bad this time?” he prompts Kakashi. 

Kakashi hides behind his book again. “Three days off before my next mission.” 

Giving him an appraising look out of the corner of his eyes, Iruka hums. “Stay for dinner?” 

“Is Naruto going to yell some more?” 

“Not if I can help it.” 

Naruto does not do any more yelling, but he does drop a bomb on them midway through the meal. “So,” he says, squinting suspiciously between them. “Are you guys like… dating?” 

Kakashi, halfway through pulling his mask back up between bites, nearly shows Naruto his entire face. Iruka chokes a little, but does a better job maintaining his composure. 

He slides Kakashi a look and clears his throat. “We, uh, actually haven’t talked about it.” 

Face very much on fire, Kakashi steels his nerves. “I would like to. If you’d have me.” 

Naruto’s eyes are threatening to bulge out of his head. Kakashi is seriously considering making a swift exit via the window, consequences be damned. Iruka’s a nearly equal shade of red now. 

“I—yes. Yes,” Iruka says, incredibly flustered. 

Kakashi lets out the breath he was holding. Naruto looks vaguely ill. 

“You’re not allowed to kiss in front of me,” he says petulantly, decimating the moment. 

Kakashi is about to tell him to stuff it when Iruka kicks him under the table.  _ Fine, okay, _ Kakashi can behave for one meal with his incredibly bratty student. He spends most of it in a bit of a daze anyway, missing most of whatever Naruto is blabbing to Iruka about. 

He’s dating Iruka. 

*

Naruto runs off to find his friends after dinner, or maybe Sakura beat some tact into him somewhere along the way and he’s actually being polite. It’s hard to tell with that one. 

Kakashi helps with the dishes, his elbows bumping gently with Iruka’s. If he could bottle this feeling up and keep it close, it’d get him through more long nights than he can count. 

He’s still not sure that this is real—that he deserves this, but he’s too relaxed right now to spiral over it. 

Arms slip around his waist as he places the last dish back in the cabinet. “Is this okay? This doesn’t hurt, does it?” Iruka mumbles into his shoulder blade, as if Kakashi hasn’t just directly ascended. 

“It’s good,” Kakashi answers. It’s perfect. He reaches up and tugs his mask down below his chin. “Iruka?” 

“Mmmm?” 

Kakashi turns, and is immensely relieved when Iruka barely blinks at his bare face. There’s a pause, and then Iruka leans up and presses his lips over the small beauty mark on Kakashi’s chin. 

The tension drains out of him so rapidly that for a moment, his knees wobble. He compensates by leaning into Iruka, who graciously wraps steady arms around him and holds him close. 

Kakashi can’t remember ever feeling this safe in his entire life. 

“I was afraid of this for so long,” Kakashi sighs into Iruka’s neck. 

Iruka hums. “You deserve it, you know? To be loved.” 

And maybe, just maybe, he does. Regardless, he’s going to do his best by Iruka, no matter what. 

“I might need to be reminded of that, sometimes,” he says sheepishly, pulling back to better see Iruka’s face. 

Iruka’s expression is fond. “Of course.” 

Iruka leans in for a kiss that Kakashi happily reciprocates until one of his bandaged injuries starts to pull. “I love you too, you know.” 

A laugh. “I know,” Iruka reassures him. “I know.” 

**Author's Note:**

> I can be found on tungle.hell @carry-a-world or tweeter @carry_a_world, please feel free to holler at me! I just finished my masters degree and freedom is BEAUTIFUL.


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